Coyote Hunting in Hawaii

There are no coyotes in Hawaii! If anyone plans to trap 20 or so pair of coyotes and to release them on the big island, let me know! It would be a blast to be coyote hunting Hawaii style!!!

“As with a number of other geographically isolated islands, Hawaii has problems with invasive species negatively affecting the natural biodiversity of the islands.

Most of the species within Hawaii cannot truly be classified as native species since Hawaii is a group of islands; therefore, all, or most, of the species had to migrate there or be brought over to the islands by humans. However, there are a majority of species which were introduced for specific reasons yet they have disrupted Hawaiian biodiversity. The mongoose was introduced to Hawaii in the mid-19th century in an attempt to control the large rat population in the sugar cane fields. However, since then, the mongoose population has grown to large numbers without controlling the nocturnal rat population and has greatly diminished the population of ground nesting birds.

Another example of an invasive species introduced in the 19th century is the fire tree, which is a small shrub that was brought from the Azores, Madeira, and the Canary Islands as an ornamental plant or for firewood. However, now it poses a serious threat to native plants on young volcanic sites, lowland forests, and shrublands, where it forms dense monocultural stands Another plant, the strawberry guava, was introduced in the early 19th century as an edible fruit. However, it now poses a major threat to Hawaii’s rare endemic flora and fauna by forming shade-casting thickets with dense mats of surface feeder roots.

Invasive species threaten biodiversity by causing disease, acting as predators or parasites, acting as competitors, altering habitat, or hybridizing with local species.

Disease
Invasive species often carry new diseases for native species. For example, the biting fly in Hawaii are small, even tiny, and include many species, some of which are vectors of diseases while others bite and cause considerable nuisance and health-related problems.[3] The introduction of mosquitoes to Hawaii has resulted in the spread of avian malaria, and increases the risk of dengue and west Nile virus (not known to be in Hawaii yet).

Predators
Invasive predators can severely reduce the population sizes of native species, or even drive them extinct, because native prey species may not have evolved defenses against the novel predators.

Competition
Oftentimes the introduced species is better equipped to survive and competes with the native species for food or other resources. For example, the strawberry guava tree is one of Hawaii’s worst invasive species. It is dangerous because it crowds out native plant species, breaks up natural areas, disrupts native animal communities, alters native ecosystem processes like water production, and provides refuge for alien fruit flies that are a major pest of Hawaiian agriculture.[4]

Habitat alteration
Invasive species can change the state of an environment in many ways based on how they feed and interact with their new surroundings. These interactions along with competition can limit the amount and type of resources for native species.

Hybridization
Hybridization occurs when members of two different species mate with one another and produce viable offspring that carry genes from both parents. When an invasive species is much more abundant than a native relative, they may hybridize so often that the invaders genes “flood” the native species, such that no individuals contain the entire genotype of the native species, thus effectively driving the native species to extinction. For example, hybridization between Introduced mallards and the native Hawaiian duck (koloa maoli) and between the rarest European duck (the white-headed duck) and the invasive North American ruddy duck may result in the extinction of the native species.

Cultural Practice Impacts
In Hawaii, the Hawaiian culture is closely connected to its environment and native species. Chants, ceremonies, hula, and other practices involve the use of plants (both native and Polynesian-introduced), traditional access to places of importance, and other activities that can be directly affected by invasive species. For example, taro (kalo, in Hawaiian) is defined in the Hawaiian Creation Chant as the plant from which Hawaiians were formed and is considered a sacred plant. The introduction of the golden apple snail, which attacks taro, threatens the very existence of Hawaiian ancestors.” – Wikipedia